RIB Software

The North American construction industry is on an incredible run in 2018 with spending up quite a bit even since last year. However, this is creating other issues. Construction is one of the industries dealing with a talent shortage, and although BIM is in greater use and iPads have found their way to many job sites, construction has not embraced technology and continuous improvement philosophies as quickly as markets such as manufacturing and healthcare. With a background in construction, engineering and innovation, RIB Software is focused on delivering solutions that can ease these struggles for builders large and small.

With a motto of “running together,” RIB takes pride in being a global pioneer in construction innovation, delivering new ways of thinking and technology for construction projects across a variety of industries. RIB’s goal is to work alongside clients throughout their project processes, as much as they want them involved, developing clients for life. A few years ago, RIB introduced a new enterprise platform, iTWO, which is an on-premise, 5D BIM solution for customers’ entire building needs. Earlier this year, RIB launched MTWO, a SaaS platform that combines its iTWO system with Microsoft offerings such as Azure, single sign-on, Office365, PowerBI, Cortana and Hololens.

“We signed an agreement with Microsoft in April to release the iTWO platform on Microsoft’s technology stack, because with Microsoft, we had an opportunity to create a vertical cloud just for construction,” RIB CTO Mickey Carr says. “RIB is not just a group of technology folks – we are engineers and construction experts, and we used that expertise to build iTWO.”

“A lot of this is driven with the goal of pushing out inefficiency in the construction industry,” he continues. “We’re offering efficient systems that work together in different ways and can look more at the holistic level of construction. There is not enough labor in the world to build what we need with the current processes we use. Additionally, constructors know there’s a possibility that other players could come into the market and disrupt some of the players who already exist. With this technology, construction can do more efficiently and learn from aerospace, manufacturing and healthcare that a little investment in technology can be a big help.”

End-to-End Management

Carr describes MTWO as “a new way to work.” It is a 5D BIM solution, so contractors can build their projects virtually before going on-site. But MTWO also is structured to help contractors work more efficiently with big data analytics, machine learning AI and IoT capabilities. AI will link the field and the office, and will help build a project database that will allow for machine learning and analysis. IoT will help RIB collect the information it plans to leverage to build MTWO’s machine-learning platform.

“We are strong believers that the construction industry hasn’t really valued its data,” Carr says. “We believe in managing the project end-to-end inside of one platform so data continuity isn’t an issue. MTWO was built to have the latest data that is continuously updated and structured so it goes to the right user at the right time.”

MTWO already is improving the way clients work. The 5D BIM tools help them to make the most efficient decisions, and because MTWO runs all of its functions from a single database, all of its tools work together and talk to each other. The system was built for collaboration – so all internal stakeholders can connect on it, as well as external organizations if the client chooses. As a result, this reduces rework and change-orders, which yields less material waste, better use of the workforce, faster delivery on projects and greater client satisfaction.

There is a multitude of tools to use on a construction project, Carr explains, but 500 tools can cause 1,000 different points of information, which he describes as “a spaghetti diagram of connections.” This yields risk and inefficiency, and MTWO aims to provide “real data” and a much better way to operate.

“We’ve partnered with academic folks – schools like Georgia Tech and Stanford – to see what workers and processes look like in the future,” he says. “We also partnered with Flex, which has more than $1 billion in revenue in 13 different industries. We brought in their experts on lean, supply chain management and logistics, and used their knowledge to go to our construction partners and help them implement more lean methodologies into the construction process. By getting more modular in our construction approach, contractors can deliver the same quality in less time, if not better quality.

“MTWO is not just technology – we’re introducing new concepts, new ways of doing business and new working methods,” he adds.

Tangible Interaction

New methods of working – and technology that easily allows for this – are important as the construction industry evolves and workforce needs adapt. RIB designed MTWO to help senior staff members as well as new recruits, and to ensure there is little brain drain as the older staff members retire.

“The industry definitely is seeing some experience gaps – there are senior folks who are successful but have a certain way of doing things, while at the same time companies have to attract new people with new technology,” Carr says. “It was a binary world, but the new generation is growing up on tablets and they need to tangibly interact with content. This drives their development and guides how they need to work when they enter the workforce. The new generation is much more tech savvy, so they will be much more focused on how to do things in a new and better way.

“The sea change will come to the industry whether we like it or not, and we will need to migrate some of the senior knowledge and experience into these platforms so it’s best for the organization,” he adds.

With the Microsoft technology, MTWO can take traditional work that was done manually and automate it. Carr cites the example of automating schedule development so it addresses every aspect of the project. Additionally, since many of us are already talking to Amazon’s Alexa or Siri on our iPhones, MTWO has a voice component because the same tools should be available with construction technology. It’s important to RIB to integrate voice recognition with current working methods from virtual-reality and augmented-reality standpoints.

“We are leveraging Microsoft’s AI technology and applying our engineering smarts to it,” Carr says. “We want this technology to do things that we shouldn’t be paying project engineers to be doing. But it’s simpler than that – we also want the technology to give us time to spend on analytics. By integrating the data, we can look well ahead of time and see what the project may cost or what the market conditions are in the area we want to build. Normally there is no time to take that into account because all of these things that are involved are currently disconnected.”

Greater Understanding

MTWO is being offered on the cloud because that is the nature of today’s technology, and because it puts less pressure on contractors’ IT staffs. The cloud makes its system more turnkey for clients. Some clients already implemented MTWO after having used RIB’s iTWO platform for a few years, and the company has received a lot of positive feedback.

“Clients have been using iTWO for awhile, and that was very well received, otherwise we wouldn’t have gone so hard on putting it on Azure and offering MTWO,” Carr says. “Clients have seen a very tangible reduction in the time it takes to quantify their work. With MTWO, they have a greater ability to see collaboration, they have better scheduling abilities and it’s easier to ensure quality. There is a better understanding between the different stakeholders to see what their project really looks like, so everyone is really appreciating each other’s role more than we have in the past. Clients are seeing better projects from a quality aspect as well as time and cost-management aspects.”

RIB was founded in Germany in the 1960s and its focus has been on cost engineering and cost estimating for construction, but it realized it could do much more by helping clients manage projects from end to end, from the center outward. Carr notes that five to six years ago, RIB acquired a few technology platforms for cost estimating, with its goal being to help clients establish projects centrally around cost estimating.

“We are a technology company, and we maintain that with a 30 percent investment in R&D every year,” Carr says. “We’re also heavily investing in the practitioner because we have to balance our technology with strong industry knowledge. Not just in one vertical and not in a particular region – our global presence allows us to see best practices around the world, then learn from that and implement those practices to take advantage of the best that is out there.

“Our technology focus has been very clear: We have a single-source code and that is our approach,” he continues. “We’re offering one platform, one cloud-based solution that can be run on any browser and anywhere with an internet or wireless connection. MTWO is offering role-based, tailored views for each individual user, not more or less than what they need. People retain more information when they can see it in front of them, and we are giving a greater understanding to the construction industry.”